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Kirk is supposed to be a military genius. He beats Spock at chess. A natural leader. Not some oversexed blowhard.

There was a a nice critique of the new Star Trek, more or less "In the original the crew was a bunch of nerds that HS nerds could relate to (Shatner>drama, Spock>supernerd, Scotty>engineers etc...), and in the remake they've turned into the popular crowd."

smart managers don't waste their entire *()%! bullpen with an 8 run lead in the 9th.

575. cardsfanboy Posted: October 24, 2012 at 11:25 PM (#4282639)

it wasn't his fault that Abrams had never watched Star Trek in his life and thought that Trek was a plotless/pointless driven franchise who dealt with simple black and white characterization for motivation, and believed that all the characters were simple caricatures that were being accurately portrayed by popular parody.

- well i have watched prolly every star trek episode - although CERTAINLY not as much as SOME of youse guys. it WAS a plotless/pointless driven franchise who dealt with simple black and white characterization for motivation and all the characters WERE simple caricatures that were being accurately portrayed by popular parody

My favorite Bond movies are the very very early ones, which I think strike the right balance between "actually good movie" and "silly popcorn nonsense." Then there were about 20 in a row that went way too far towards the silly popcorn nonsense (especially with Moore and Brosnan). I think they were right to try and recalibrate it back towards "actually good movie" with the Craig movies, but they went too far in that direction, pushing Bond as a gritty damaged complex man.

Sorry, I'm on a roll. The whole Kirk as skirt-chasing horndog is based on the absolute worst of the original episodes (and there were plenty of stinkers). Consider the best episodes of the original series. They would include the following:

The Corbomite Maneuver
Balance of Terror
Squire of Gothos
The Devil in the Dark
The City on the Edge of Forever
Amok Time
The Doomsday Machine
The Trouble with Tribbles
The Enterprise Incident

You could include a few more. Anyway, in none of those is Kirk panting after women. He develops a real emotional attachment to Edith Keeler -- no bimbo she. And ... that's it.

But no, it has to be Mark of Gideon and Elaan of Troyius and Gamesters of Triskelion that define the series. I think the real horndogs are the viewers who liked the scantily-clad women.

- well i have watched prolly every star trek episode - although CERTAINLY not as much as SOME of youse guys. it WAS a plotless/pointless driven franchise who dealt with simple black and white characterization for motivation and all the characters WERE simple caricatures that were being accurately portrayed by popular parody

Have to disagree. The motivations were always more complex than "bad guy is bad guy" in nearly every episode you had sympathy for the bad guy of the week. Very rarely, in the original series was the bad guy just a simple bad guy. As to the caricatures of the main cast, you had Bones who was a pretty bloodthirsty doctor in the first season,(walked around with phasers all the time, wanted Spock to kill, because it was logical etc) and meanwhile, the logic unthinking character valued life above and beyond logic. Kirk was a tactical genius, natural leader, and still had self doubts, etc. In the first season, the female characters were pretty flimsily portrayed, I'll grant you that.

Sorry, I'm on a roll. The whole Kirk as skirt-chasing horndog is based on the absolute worst of the original episodes (and there were plenty of stinkers). Consider the best episodes of the original series. They would include the following:

I'm currently watching the original show from the beginning, one episode a day(roughly)... To be honest after about the fourth episode I had regretted my decision to do this, It wasn't until Mudd's women(episode 6, not a great episode, but an enjoyable one) did I actually not mind watching the show, and "The Corbomite Maneuver" was the first episode that I actually enjoyed. Balance of Terror is so far, by far, the best I've seen of the first season(only up to episode 17 Squire of Gothos) so there are some clunkers in there, but my mind is fresh, and Kirk is often portrayed as at least a guy who constantly get the women to look at him. (I like the fact that in Shore Leave, McCoy gets the girl) But the best part of the show is Kirk's tactical acumen. I think that the parodies completely undermine that.